Land Acquisition for Metro Extension Yet to Pick Up

KAKKANAD: It was on September 16 that Kochi Metro Rail Limited (KMRL) conducted a board meeting in Delhi to approve the detailed project report (DPR) for the extension of metro rail from Kaloor Jawaharlal Nehru stadium to Info park via Kakkanad and to execute the project in the first phase itself.

However, even two months after the meeting, the land acquisition department functioning at the Civil Station here is yet to get any communication for acquiring the land for the much-hyped extension.The project cost for covering 11.17 km extension is estimated to come around `1,600 crore apart from taxes.

“We haven’t received any information regarding the extension of Metro to Kakkanad. We came to know about the details of the project from the media only. The inability to get funds from the agency is said to be a major reason for not starting the work,” said an official of the Kochi Metro land acquisition department on condition of anonymity.The alignment fixed by the KMRL for extension of Metro Rail starts from the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in Kaloor through Palarivattom, Padamugal and Pump junction and then to the Infopark campus via signal junction.